Notch on piracy: "if a pirated game is a lost sale, should bad reviews be illegal?"

Notch, the developer of Minecraft, has explained his take on intellectual property and piracy during a series of rapid fire talks at the Game Developer Conference in San Francisco. Speaking to developers and journalists he explained: "A lot of big companies try to make piracy like theft; I wouldn't steal a car, but I would steal a good design. If I liked another person's apartment, I would try to make mine look like someone else's... but that's not stealing."

He went on to criticise the idea of a lost sale, and explained his view on how game developers should consider a deeper relationship with their consumers. "If a lost sale is so bad, should bad reviews be illegal? What about missed release dates?" He also believes that pirates can be converted to customers, if developers are smart. "If you just make your and keep adding to it, the people who copyright infringed would buy it the next week."